Will AI Replace My Marketing Company? Kind of, Maybe, but No, Not at all.
AI is not magic, marketing is hard, and with AI optimization services quickly becoming the darling of the digital marketing ecosystem, things are not getting simpler.
AI makes many marketing tasks easier, allowing for the rapid gathering of information, the creation of written content, data analysis, competitive intelligence, and the development of image-based assets, all of which can be created in seconds. This does not mean the work is easier; it just means more of it can be done faster.
What AI cannot do is comprehend how to utilize AI to reach a level of success that surpasses everyone else who is using AI to achieve that same level of success.
If everyone is given the same advice, it instantly devalues the advice.
Will AI put some marketing companies out of business? – Yes
But the better question is, how many more marketing companies will go out of business beyond the normal rate of failure?
- According to studies, nearly 45% of marketing companies shut their doors within the first five years.
- Only 30% will remain after ten years.
- Fewer than 20% will reach the two-decade mark.
Will AI be more responsible for the shuttering of agencies than poor management? Sub-par business acumen, lack of funding, personal tragedy, or those who learned they are not cut out for the rigors of entrepreneurship?
COVID-19 caused the permanent shutdown of over 97,000 businesses. Will AI take out more businesses than a global pandemic? Unlikely.
Newspapers were predicted to die at the beginning of the turn of the century. People are still reading newspapers! Not many, most of whom are homeless, in a library reading the ones attached to a broom handle, but the newsprint still rolls off the press each day.
A recent article about the “Hot Sauce Factor,” written by Keynote Speaker Larry Bailin, touched on how marketing companies get caught in the hype of emerging tech like AI and don’t have the vision to do much more than use the trending vernacular, those agencies will limp along and eventually shutter. Agencies that have secured in-house talent, those that strive to be three moves ahead of the industry and utilize emerging tech like AI to create more and better outcomes for their clients, are the marketing companies that will be the recipients of the glory of being in the top 20%, and believe me, it’s glorious.
Can’t AI Help Me Show Up in AI?
AI will help you optimize for AI overviews and standalone AI platforms by providing basic best practices, such as suggestions for the structure and concise nature of your content, including proper heading formatting and well-structured schema, which builds authority.
The advice AI gives you about AI optimization is almost identical to what AI provides when asking how to perform search engine optimization. Why? Because relevancy is relevant no matter where the search starts.
Optimizing for AI is not a service offered by AI, just as SEO marketing services are not offered by Google. Generalities and best practices are a great place to start for the do-it-yourselfer or micro-business, however. AI will not adequately address aggressive markets and complex marketing needs; those companies with complex marketing needs require AI optimization the most.
Similar to the false hope created by paint-by-numbers SEO services, if everyone does the same things, no one wins; all that is achieved is leveling of the playing field, and that’s not winning.
What AI will likely (and quickly) add to the mix is a lot of average marketing. Lazy marketers will create lazy marketing that, at best, is right in the middle, just as close to the top as it is to the bottom. What AI won’t do is give you a structured plan to beat all those who are beating you.
Embrace your agency or give them their walking papers, but do it fast.
No one is waiting for you to get this right. Not prospects, customers, or competitors, they will leave you in the dust. AI Optimization Services are the best bottom-of-funnel customer acquisition opportunity that has come along since September 4, 1998.